Connection lost: The Cinderella story of online multiplayer

LAN Tunneling

While the gaming companies were still figuring out how to deliver a compelling multiplayer experience, the enthusiast community took it upon itself to develop its own multiplayer network out of duct tape and elbow grease. Games like Halo: Combat Evolved and Mario Kart: Double Dash didn’t inherently support online multiplayer, but they did offer multiplayer over Local Area Networks.

Through clever use of tunneling software, players could use services like Warp Pipe and XLink Kai to play multiplayer matches around the world. Eventually, Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo took the hint, and moved into the realm of modern multiplayer gaming.

Xbox Live

In 2002, a full year after the original Xbox hit store shelves, Microsoft launched Xbox Live. People could buy DLC and even small arcade games on the storefront, but the core of Xbox Live has always been the multiplayer matchmaking, a unified friends list, and built-in voice chat. It blew Sony and Nintendo out of the water when it was released, and Xbox Live remains the premiere online multiplayer platform.

The first Xbox didn’t last long on the market, and the Xbox 360 made its way to the public in 2005. Microsoft doubled-down on the Xbox Live service, and that decision turned out to be extremely fruitful for the Redmond-based company. Now with the Xbox One, online gaming is more important than ever. Games are increasingly multiplayer-focused, and big titles like Titanfall will absolutely make or break this new platform.

Tagged In

Post a Comment

JD Rahman

The PC side of gaming went online a lot earlier than console.

Counterstrike, Half-Life Deathmatch and Team Fortress Classic were popular and successful on-line, in the late nineties.
Warcraft 3/TFT had very good online presence as well. Both with ladder games and mods such as Dota, tower defense, etc

And the MMORPG genre went nuts well before 2005.

Brian Castell

We know. But no one cares. This article is about consoles. smh

dwq

It should say so in the fucking headline then.

Hikari .

I don’t remember the exact year, but it was said that TecToy in Brasil was the first company in the world to provide online multiplayer service for consoles. It was for Mega Drive, with a device between the console and the cartridge. It was available only in SSP (São Paulo), ppl from other cities could use it but would need to pay expensive taxes for DDD.

Use of this site is governed by our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Copyright 1996-2015 Ziff Davis, LLC.PCMag Digital Group All Rights Reserved. ExtremeTech is a registered trademark of Ziff Davis, LLC. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Ziff Davis, LLC. is prohibited.